Impaling means on a clamp for holding packing material to be cut



March 1, 1960 E. c. HAWKINS IMPALING MEANS ON A CLAMP FOR HOLDING PACKING MATERIAL TO BE CUT Filed Feb. 6, 1958 United States Patent IIVIPALING MEANS ON A CLAMP FOR HOLDING PACKING MATERIAL TO BE CUT Earl C. Hawkins, Bulfalo, N-Y.

Application February 6, 1958, Serial No. 713,733

1 Claim. (Cl. 269-131) This invention relates to a new and useful improvement in a packing cutter or device for making packing rings. It is a well known fact that coil or spiral packing is resilient and when tautly wrapped in an overlapping convolution around a cylindrical forming mandrel preparatory to being cut into individual rings of precise size and with ends meeting in a perfect butt joint, it is under the stresses of both tension and compression.

The principal object of this invention is to immobilize and maintain the essential preparatory condition of tautness by adding a relatively simple impaling element to an already existent device or cutter and thereby substitute full and positive mechanical immobilization for semimanual.

Other advantages will be apparent during the following description.

In the accompanying drawings forming part of this application and in which like numerals are employed to designate like parts throughout:

Figure No. 1 is a front view or elevation of the immobilizing element.

Figure No. 2 is an obverse view of the immobilizing element.

Figure No. 3 is a side view or elevation showing details of assembly. 7

Figure No. 4 is a top view or plan also showing details of assembly.

Figure 5 is a view showing a minimum of the old construction covered by Patent No. 2,580,772, issued January 1, 1952 to me, as will sutfice to show the connection of the new invention as added thereto.

Referring to Figures 1 through 5, the numeral 11 designates the basic secondary impaling element which can be made of brass, aluminum, die-cast white metal, plastic, or other material in the shape shown. On its face it has a drawer-knob, for the operators thumb, afi'ixed to it by a machine screw 14. A hole 13 is drilled and tapped in it for the permanent attachment to the threaded end of rod 15. On its obverse side there is a plurality of points 17, such as steel phonograph needles, embedded in it in a pattern so that the larger the size of packing being cut the more points become automatically engaged in the impalement thereof. Points 17 are slanted slightly to resist the stress of tension that will be imposed upon them, also to keep the impaled packing from slipping off. The steel or brass rod 15 is threaded one end companion to tapped hole 13 in impaling element 11. It also has a small hole drilled in its extreme opposite end for cotter-pin 16, which cotter-pin is a stop limiting the forward movement of rod 15. Sleeve-bearing 18 for rod 15 is of an inside diameter which will permit rod 15 to move freely back and forth longitudinally therein for adjustment to the size of packing being cut, also to rotate freely about its axis for the purpose of bringing its attached impaling element 11 over clockwise from its vertical out-of-use position into its horizontal in-use position on a mandrel. All the component parts are assembled as shown in Figures 3, 4 and 5. Figure 5 shows the assembled device as permanently 2,926,906 Patented Mar. 1, 1960 attached to, incorporated with and made an integral part of the older device or cutter perviously identified, by screwing the threaded end of sleeve-bearing 18 into its companion drilled, tapped and precisely located hole 19 in vertically disposed body member 10 of the older device. Hole 19 is so located in body member 10 that when impaling element 11 is rotated clockwise over onto a mandrel into its in-use horizontal position the line of its lower edge will contact all mandrels on the left-hand side of their knife-groove 22 making the line a tangent of all mandrel peripheries because the mandrels all position the same regardless of their diametrical measurement. This condition makes the forward edge 20 of impaling element 11, which rises perpendicularly from the point of tangency, coincide with the left-hand side of knife-slit 23 in the vertically disposed body member 10, a relationship that remains unchanged when impaling element 11 is moved back and forth along groove line 22 in being adjusted to the size of packing being cut. The alignment of forward edge 20 of impaling element 11 with knifeslit 23 in body member 10 makes a secondary guide for the cutting knife and thereby insures a square cut essential for a perfect butt joint. Cotter-pin 16 in rod 15 is a stop which limits the forward movement of the rod 15 when it impacts sleeve-bearing 18 so that impaling element 11 will, when rotated clockwise over onto a mandrel, always land on a mandrel, the mandrels all being of the same linear dimension. Sleeve-bearing 18 is screwed forward from the rear of its companion threaded hole 19 in body member 10 until its forward end protrudes sufiiciently to become a stop limiting the backward movement of impaling element 11. This stop provides a small clearance between its impaling points 17 and the vertically disposed body member 10, and the same identical clearance between the points 25 embedded in body member 10 and impaling element 11, said impacts tending to blunt points 17 and 25 of the intermeshing point systems. The pattern of the points 17 of impaling element 11 is slightly displaced from the pattern of points 25 of body member to avoid interference one with the other when intermeshing on packing of small size or when there is no packing between them.

The use of the improved device may be briefly stated as follows: One end of the coil or spiral packing is impaled on the points of the body member 10. The packing thus impaled is then wrapped clockwise and tautly in an overlapping convolution around the cylindrical forming mandrel. While so held by the operators right hand impaling element 11 is rotated clockwise over onto the mandrel by the operators left-hand, the thumb and fingers of that hand being so disposed that his thumb is on drawer-knob 12 and his fingers over the top of body member 10. By compression between his thumb and fingers so disposed the overlapping convolution of packing is compacted and completely immobilized by the interrneshing point systems 17 and 25. The imprisonment is foursided, on the bottom by the mandrel, on both sides by being compacted and impaled, and on the top by the downward pressure of the cutting knife. The cutting knife is guided downward for a true, square out by knife-slit 23 in body member 10 and the forward edge 20 of impaling element 11. The cut ends cannot mush out nor can the out before the advancing knife blade spread into the most undesirable of all cuts a spread V. A perfect butt joint is thus assured.

Having described my invention, what I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters patent is:

In a device for making packing rings, a frame member provided with a fixed mandrel for supporting a convolution of packing material, a rectangular cutout in the frame member extending from an outer edge of said frame member toward the axis of said mandrel and termi- 2,928,908 3 d nating adjacent the outer periphery of said mandrel, a the other said member for engaging and holding material rod rotatably and slidably mounted in bearing means in to be cut. said frame member, a clamp member provided with a straight forward edge fixed to an end of said rod and References Cited in the file of this patent extendingdaterally of said r od, said clamp member in 5 UNITED STATES PATENTS its operatlve clamping position presenting sald-straight forward edge in spaced alignment with an edge of said 2,205,743 Breth June 25, 1940 rectangular cutout and acting as a secondary guide means 2,580,772 Hawkins Jan. 1, 1952 for a cutting tool and one of said members provided with 2,822,011 Lundell Feb. 4, 1958 a plurality of pointed'impaling means extending toward 10 

